1. Technical Field
The present invention relates generally to an online behavior modification method, and more particularly to a method of providing an individualized online behavior modification program using medical aids.
2. Description of the Related Art
Various methods and systems are publicly available to assist people in changing unhealthy or otherwise undesirable habitual health-related behavior, such as smoking, over eating, and drug and alcohol abuse. Assisting people to cease smoking is one of the more common applications. For example, National Health Promotions, Inc., under the Service Mark SMOKE STOPPERS®, provides an approach that makes use of a bound, multi-page workbook entitled “Quitter's Countdown: Preparing to Stop,” Copyright 1991, by the National Center for Health Promotion. The workbook includes a multi-page questionnaire to be filled out by an individual desiring to quit smoking. Following the questionnaire portion in the workbook is a sequence of pages establishing the regimen of the non-smoking plan to be followed by the individual. In particular, these successive pages of the workbook include instructions for each successive day of the plan, e.g., instructions for “Day One,” “Day Two,” etc. These daily instructions are spread out over a number of pages in the workbook and included text, charts, diagrams, etc.
While the workbook or calendar approach for providing daily instructions to achieve health-related behavior modification has considerable merit, it suffers from several drawbacks. One of the most significant drawbacks is that the multi-page format of the materials for each day of the plan tends to overwhelm the individual with excessive information. Moreover, the fact that the workbook is bound and includes all of the materials provided at one time, enables the individual to prematurely view latter stage instructions, which could tend to distract the individual. Further still, if the daily pages include the calendar date, so that the plan is tied to any particular date (e.g., the first day of the plan is June 6th), it is susceptible to deviation by the individual as will be discussed later.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,207,580 (Strecher) discloses a health-related behavior change and adherence aid system, which overcomes some of the disadvantages of the prior art. The disclosed embodiments of that system are particularly directed to helping a person stop smoking permanently and utilizes the technique of “computer tailoring” to derive a particular regimen to be followed by the individual wishing to stop smoking. To that end, health risk and psychological information is gathered from the individual. That information comprises demographic information relevant to the health risk, history and patterns of the existing health-related behavior, motives to change that behavior, a specific behavior change goal, specific dates for beginning phases of the health-related behavior change process, and barriers to changing the health-related behavior. This data is provided into a computer system for processing to develop a specific or “tailored” plan best suited to that individual to maximize his/her chance of success. Thus, the computer makes use of an algorithm to process the data to produce a customized plan or regimen to be followed. To facilitate the plan the person is provided with a calendar defining the plan and instructions and recommendations for the individual to follow. The calendar is provided to the individual either in the form of a single monthly calendar sheet, i.e., a sheet with spaces for each day of the month, or series of date book pages. In either case the calendar includes spaces containing specific instructions and advice for the individual to follow. Moreover, and quite significantly, each of the days of the calendar is “dated.” That is, they bear indicia with the specific calendar date of that day.
While the system and method of the Strecher patent are generally suitable for their intended purposes, they still leave something to be desired from the standpoint of efficiency and efficacy. In particular, by relying on “dated pages,” wherein the particular instructions of the regimen are tied to a specific calendar date (e.g., a quit date of June 9th), should the individual using the method miss that date or any other date and thus get out of synchronism with the plan, the individual may wind up skipping another day or multiple days to get back in synchronism with the regimen. This deviation from the plan may result in its failure. Moreover, by presenting the information in the form of a monthly calendar with all the information for each day of the month being perceptible at one time, the individual may be overwhelmed by the information and may become distracted by prematurely reading latter day instructions. Thus, the system of the Strecher patent provides too much information on the one hand, while also providing too little information on the other. With regard to the latter, the amount of information provided for a specific day is rather limited by the inherent size of the monthly calendar sheet and the particular daily spaces for the daily instructions.
Other prior art methods or systems that exist for providing information to individuals wishing to modify a habit or some undesirable health-related behavior are found in the following U.S. Pat. No. 4,951,197 (Mellinger); U.S. Pat. No. 4,853,854 (Behar et al.). Regimen calendars have also been proposed in the patent literature, e.g., U.S. Pat. No. 5,016,917 (Dubner) and U.S. Pat. No. 5,090,733 (Busiere).
In more recent art, U.S. Pat. No. 5,967,789 (Segel et al.), disclosed is a system and method for stopping or modifying undesirable heath related habits. In Segel, a computerized method is disclosed in which the inflexibility (i.e., the rigidity of the schedule) of the above-mentioned patents is overcome by receiving personal information from an individual using the method while an initial plan is in use, thereby allowing the initial plan to be modified accordingly, based on the received personal information.
In the realm of behavior modification methods, especially those dealing with chemical dependency or over use, a large number of medical aids, both prescription and non-prescription, are constantly being developed. The medical aids, when used properly, can greatly assist an individual in changing their behavior or overcoming a chemical dependency. Notwithstanding the foregoing prior art, a need exists for an effective method of providing an individualized online behavior modification program including an individualized treatment plan utilizing these medical aids. A behavior modification program such as this, will enable a user to create, monitor, and modify an individualized treatment program with greater ease as the entire process can be performed online conforming to the user's busy schedule.